However, Mikko I Arevuo, who advocates of free
markets and small government parts company with the Ayn Rand Institute because
it is atheistic, but he agrees with is more sympathetic to its objectivist
philosophy and provides a one paragraph explanation of it outlined byDr Edward Younkins:

“Hierarchically, philosophy, including its
metaphysical, epistemological, and ethical dimensions, precedes and determines
politics which, in turn, precedes and determines economics. Rand bases her
metaphysics on the idea that reality is objective and absolute.
Epistemologically, the Randian view is that man’s mind is competent to achieve
objectively valid knowledge of that which exists. Rand’s moral theory of
self-interest is derived from man’ s nature as a rational being and end in
himself, recognizes man’s right to think and act according to his freely-chosen
principles, and reflects a man’s potential to be the best person he can be in
the context of his existing circumstances. This leads to the notion of the
complete separation of political power and economic power – that proper
government should have no economic favours to convey. The role of the government
is, thus, to protect man’s natural rights through the use of force, but only in
retaliation and only against those who initiate the use of force. Capitalism,
the resulting economic system, is based on the recognition of individual
rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately
owned. For Rand, capitalism, the system of laissez-faire, is the only
moral system.”

Comment

I read most of
Ayn Rand’s paper-back philosophy books and novels in the 1950s and 1960s.I was struck then by its fatal
weakness: to “save the world” she requires the world to adopt her objectivist philosophy,
or at least behave as if they did, a most unlikely outcome.Therefore, it ain’t likely to happen.

“For Rand,
capitalism, the system of laissez-faire, is the only moral system.”That may well be logical, given her
philosophy (ignoring for the meanwhile that ‘laissez-faire’ is a dubious fork
of morality; but laissez-faire’s leading advocates in the 19th
century were spokesmen for the capitalist owners who considered laissez-faire
to mean freedom for them to oppose legislation (the Factory Acts) seeking to
protect employees from their employers’ low wages, unsafe working practices,
and their use of child labour.

Adam Smith’s
advocacy of Natural Liberty was quite different from laissez-faire (he never
mentioned the words). Natural Liberty, as expressed by Smith, equalised the
rights of all participants in commercial society, employers and labourers. This does not prevent modern economists
from associating laissez-faire with Adam Smith’s name, a habit that goes right
back to the early 19th century and continues into the 21st. Many
advocates in the 19th Century conflated laissez-faire to meanonly freedom for employers and
governments.

Rand’s assertion
that her
“moral theory of self-interest is derived from man’ s nature as a rational
being and end in himself” sits
comfortably with neo-classical theories of ‘rational’ human beings (who ‘Max U’
everything).This belief is
unfounded.Humans are
capable of reasoning and their individual ability to reason is not the same as
all of us arriving at the same answers or choices. Jails are full of the
victims of their own ‘rational’ choices, given their circumstances, and many more
prisons would be required if judicial processes were applied for the rational
choices of those in government who inflict misery on their victims. Our
behaviour in different circumstances may be considered individually as
‘rational’, given our individual perceptions of our specific situations, but there
is no reason to believe our individual actions from our perceptions of the
circumstances are subject to a universal rationality.Humans in human societies are not like that. In practice
there is no general rationality.

It is in this
area that I parted company with Mises in his “Human Action” – a very large tome
I read a few years back – in which he derives everything that follows in his
book from the rigorous logic of the consequences of his founding proposition.

I prefer Smith’s
approach of studying what probably happened since a few humans left the forest and then, a minority
at first, moved to shepherding and farming.Another minority (“at last”) moved from country life to live
in close proximity in what became towns, inevitably and indubitably, creating
commercial society, at first by processing food from the country (and leather
goods) in exchanges for processed food for manufactured
goods or services. The nature of those exchanges took many forms – some ritualistic and
wrapped in contexts (now studied by anthropologists). It was these historical
developments of traded exchanges that laid the basis for the creation of
capital that led to commercial developments.It was not a history of mere 5,000 years of debt (David Graeber) – it was
more like 200,000 years of exchange. Those humans that remained (and remain) in
the forest, or solely in shepherding or farming, remained there.There is nothing ordained about what
humans do, nor is there a particular direction by which they pass their
lifetimes in multiple generations.

Smith did not require
the conversion of everybody to new morality or a universal conformity to logic.

In fact, Smith conjectured
about humans as they were.He made
no predictions about the future(except about the future of the former British colonies in North America
becoming the wealthiest economy in the world by around 1875).Instead he studied the past to
understand the present; we might be better doing the same instead of fantasising
about a utopian philosophy of life created by a unique individual, who some report had a charismatic personality, who sold thousands of books to undergraduates (watch her with students on 'youtube). Ayn Rand's philosphy has no chance of being adopted by 6 billion people.

4 Comments:

I am tempted to call Ayn Rand's Objectivism science fiction. But really it is philosophy fiction.

Never could Rand's philosophy be implemented or become reality. Most of her arguments are outlandish, like thinking reality is absolute. But what it does do is give people pause, to think that things could be a bit different or improved.

As a metaphor the invisible hand is a kind of philosophy fiction. Nevertheless, there does seem to be a reality about it, like Paul Samuelson and others have given it.

zirthMostly right.The motives for landlords feeding their serfs were real for without food serfs would die and be unable to work. The motives of Merchants who feel insecure about their capital if sent abroad were real.Their motives led them to act the way they did, which had consequences. They acted because of the motives; not the actual consequences.The IH metaphor described the motives that "led them"; it had nothing to do with the consequences that happened; only with averting their underlying concerns.Gavin

absolutely correct. It is the same with all those posts with plans to change aspects of the world's economies for more 'moral' arrangements by people in some very rich countries. I usually suggest that they move fromCalifornia or where ever and migrate to a poor country and convert, them morally before they become corrupted by richer country's immorality,which most poorer countries' people aspire to become.You portray Rand's dilemma well, not that she would have thanked you. She seemed to have fallen out spectacularly with former disciples- much like Stalin did.Gavin